The Legend of Puff

Chapter Three

"Are you okay, Jackie?"

"I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

The boy frowned at his father, and gave no answer. Of course he was fine. It was the dragon outside that wasn't. But he wasn't going to let his father interfere with it.

There was something so, so different about this dragon. It was vulnerable, that had to be it - so dependent, so trusting. Other dragons weren't like that. This one had nestled down in his arms, and the boy had talked to it on the long journey home - whispered his name to it. "Jackie," he had murmured, his face close against the scaly ears. "My name's Jackie..."

By the time he had got home, the sun had set. His father had been worried - typical. His father didn't think he could do anything by himself. Well, he would prove it to him - he was a fine dragon trainer, and he could handle the injured animal all by himself.

His father started again. "Are you -"

"Hiccup." Jackie's mother shook her head slightly, and his father fell silent.

Jackie looked at his mother in gratitude. She always knew what to say. Astrid - best at every sport and winner of every contest in her childhood, winner of the heir to the village's affections when she was older. Best at understanding Jackie.

But he wouldn't tell her about the dragon. He was sure of that - he wasn't going to tell anyone. Not even her.

He pulled away from his father's arms, and climbed the stairs to the upper level. There were two rooms up here, and Jackie pushed open the door to the larger one.

There was already someone in here, and Jackie caught his breath. Of course - Honah Lee had been sick ever since she had gone out in the rain and caught that dreadful cold. She needed her rest. Two years old was too young to be sick for long.

Jackie tiptoed across the room, stealing glances at Honah Lee's pretty little face, but she didn't stir. He reached his bed, and slipped under the rough blankets, placing his helmet on the floor beside him. But he didn't relax under the sheets. He wasn't going to fall asleep - tonight was his night.

Pure excitement kept him happy for a while, but being in bed without wanting to sleep is singularly boring, and Jackie eventually began to kick his legs and hum and wonder when his parents would go to sleep.

He burrowed under the blankets and played for a while, but his normal games didn't please him anymore. He had never told anyone, but on the deepest, stormiest nights, he sometimes pretended to be a dragonslayer in days gone by. But somehow the game had lost its fun for him, because when he couldn't picture fierce bloodthirsty monsters anymore. Imagined dragons were now like the small one waiting outside for him. Now the very thought of the game filled him with horror.

So he pretended he was a burrowing dragon or a mole, tunnelling under the covers, and that kept him busy for awhile. But there was only so much bed to dig up - the edges kept cutting him off.

After a while, he couldn't stand the tedium anymore, and slipped out of bed. Perhaps his parents had already gone to their room without him noticing.

He crept to the top of the stairs, and crouched there, ears pricked. He couldn't hear anything down there except for the fire popping and spitting. Just when he was going to risk descending into the room below, he heard his father's voice.

"I don't think he really likes me, Astrid."

His tone was half-playful, and Jackie knew that his father was trying to joke but failing because he actually meant what he said.

His mother -

"What?"

His father again. "Jackie."

Jackie drew back slightly, his ears pricked.

"What in Valhalla are you talking about? Your head isn't screwed on right, Hiccup. Of course he likes you. He loves you. You're his dad, for Thor's sake."

There was silence again. Jackie stayed where he was, frozen, wondering whether his mother or his father was right.

He heard his mother sigh. "You're thinking about Stoick and you, aren't you?"

"Yeah."

Jackie thought back. Grandpa Stoick had died years ago - Jackie wasn't actually sure if he had ever met him, but he had heard a lot about him. How he was a magnificent dragon killer, huge and strong and tough. But he had never heard anything about his father's relationship with Stoick. He listened eagerly - his mother was talking again.

"Sometimes I think Jackie's more like Stoick than you."

Now it was his father's turn to be puzzled. "What?"

"He's small and geeky like you - " allowed Astrid.

"Thanks," Hiccup muttered.

"But in his heart - he takes convincing that dragons are actually worth being friends with."

"Yeah, he does."

"Sometimes I think he's going to grow up to be a-"

Jackie covered his ears. He was seized by a sudden fear. It wasn't one he had felt before - not the fear of disappointing his father or shaming his family, but the fear of wrecking the world his father had sought to build. He didn't want to hurt his father, but even more than that, he didn't want to be the thing that caused the death of the helpless little dragon he had rescued today.

But the word, the dreaded word, leaked through his hands into his ears.

"Dragonslayer."

"No!"

The word broke from both father and son at the same time - they sat looking at each other for a moment, both too horrified to realize that a little crime like coming out of bed and listening in the hall had been committed.

"No!" said Jackie again. He could feel his face flushing, but it wasn't with embarrassment, it was with anger and fear. He rushed down the stairs, falling the last few and landing hard on the ground, but he didn't care. He picked himself up, and rushed to his father, and - he didn't know what made him do it - for the first time in a long time, threw himself into his father's arms.

And he knew his mother had been right. He did love Hiccup.

Hiccup wrapped his arms around his son's small body, and held him tight, breathing deep, swaying slightly.

Jackie pulled away, and Hiccup let him go.

Jackie scampered out the door, and round the side of the house. It was pitch dark outside, but he found the little dragon, curled next to the woodpile, and gathered it up in his arms again.

His father was standing when he came back, his mother half-raised from her chair. When Hiccup saw the dragon, he gave a cry, and knelt down beside Jackie.

"I won't be a dragonslayer when I'm older," Jackie said, "Because I'm not when I'm now."

Hiccup smiled at his son's dreadful grammar, but became serious again when he saw the little dragon's bent wing.

"How did this happen?" he asked.

"I don't know. I found it like this."

"Oh, gosh," Hiccup said softly. "A Night Fury."

"I don't think so," Jackie said, proud to know something his dad didn't. He raised the little dragon's tail so that his father could see it better.

"Zippleback," he said.

"Wow, Jackie, you're right." Hiccup cradled the tail. "It has a Zippleback tail - but his wings and his head are Night Fury. It's an interesting combination - I've never seen it before. What if it had been born with two heads and -"

Jackie rolled his eyes. "Dad! What about its wing?"

Hiccup looked up, and brushed the wing with his fingers. "It's broken."

Jackie swallowed. "Can you fix it?"